


My Friendly House Ghost

by Evian_99



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan
Genre: Gen, Ghost nico, Kid Nico di Angelo, Kid Percy Jackson, Luckily it gets him a friend so he doesn't have to be lonely anymore, Percy breaks the One Rule of not entering the attic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-15
Updated: 2020-10-15
Packaged: 2021-03-08 20:27:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,116
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27022732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Evian_99/pseuds/Evian_99
Summary: It’s Halloween. Outside the walls of his home kids are trick or treating and his parents are out celebrating their own party. Percy is home alone watching scary ghost movies with a bag of popcorn on his lap.However, as the night carries on and the childish laughter fades away, he suddenly hears a thump coming from upstairs. The young boy feels afraid. He’s supposed to be home alone.Right?
Relationships: Nico di Angelo & Percy Jackson
Comments: 8
Kudos: 43





	My Friendly House Ghost

‘You know how to call mommy if there is something, right honey?’ Kissing Percy’s brow, she smiles at him. Her eyes sparkle with excitement, radiant in a beautiful cobalt blue gown. ‘I’ve laid down snacks on the table,’ Sally says, ‘so just take whatever you want.’

Paul is already in the door opening. He looks handsome in his suit, his tie matching his wife’s dress. ‘You sure you’re okay with staying home alone, buddy? I can call aunt Meg to come pick you up with her boys.’

Percy shakes his head so hard it makes him dizzy. It causes both of his parents to laugh, which feels strangely hurtful. He knows they don’t understand his reluctance to go to aunt Meg, understands that they don’t feel the danger she radiates. And that is despite the fact that his mom normally is scarily receptive to his feelings of people’s wrongness.

He is still pouting when Paul ruffles his hair. ‘I will be fine,’ he says, ‘I am a big boy now.’ The laughter that draws out of the two hurts even worse. Percy can feel tears burning behind his eyes but refuses to let them fall. It has been so long since they both looked so happy. Who is he to ruin that?

When the door finally falls shut behind him, the boy lets out a long breath. The telly is turned on, but it’s playing some kids show he isn’t interested in. Halloween means scary movies. Movies they both don’t let him see no matter how hard he begs.

Grabbing the remote, Percy starts pressing on the buttons. He switches from one channel to the next but doesn’t see anything he would like to watch. The childish laughter outside distracts him. And makes him feel a little alone.

He screams when a monster rips someone’s head off his body. In his fright, he drops the remote and has to blindly grab around to find it again. Pressing the button to change channels, he only dares to open his eyes when a cheerful song plays. It is a cartoon with dancing pumpkin people.

Still, he feels too scared to relax. His eyes keep glancing towards the dark hallway. The living room is safe, just as the kitchen because his mom left the lights on there. Whimpering slightly, Percy grabs the plaid from the grandfather chair in front of the fireplace and wraps it around himself.

Watching the movement of the dancing pumpkins, he curls up on the couch. A bag of popcorn is just within his reach and he quietly munches upon them as the cartoon continues its play. In the distance, the church’s bells indicate the coming of a new hour. His eyes feel a little dry, like he kept them open for too long in front of the fireplace.

Which can’t be, of course, for the fire isn’t burning there. Still, bundled up in his blanket, he feels the touch of Hypnos heavily on his brow. Keeping his attention on the pumpkins slowly becomes ever more difficult until at last he only watches them dawdle around from behind closed eyelids.

The cheerful music on the telly makes him smile, until his face relaxes in his sleep. Outside the isolated walls of the house, the night carries on. Stars speckle the sky like the freckles on the girl that lives next door, the moon providing its humble light to the people stalking the outside.

With the childish laughter of trick-or-treating kids fading away, a loud thump coming from upstairs startles him into wakefulness. Curled up in a tiny ball, Percy carefully peeks outside the safe blankets. The lights are still on with full brightness, and the hall is as menacing as it was before he was carried into the land of dreams.

On the telly there is a commercial of some doll, meaning that the sound couldn’t have possibly come from that. A deep dread fills him as a faint groaning sound reaches his ears. ‘Who… Who is there?’ he asks, but there is no answer.

Percy’s mind is racing, going over all the scenarios he saw in movies he wasn’t old enough to see quite yet. Going upstairs is what always gets people killed, but waiting downstairs surely isn’t the way to go either, right?

The boy bites his lip, not moving from where he’s sitting. He’s too scared to move from the safety of the couch. The phone is in the hallway, and that means going through the dark until he can turn a light on. Which means that he might as well do the stupid thing and check upstairs.

‘Speak up!’ he shouts. He startles from the volume of it, surprised by the sudden bravado that has disappeared as soon as the words faded away. For a long while he stays frozen in his spot, straining his ears to catch even the slightest of sounds.

Then he hears the sniffling. It’s louder than the groaning, but not as loud as the thump. A hitched sob gives him pause. He’s supposed to be home alone, right? His parents wouldn’t have lied about that.

Or would they? They have been behaving weirdly these past weeks no matter how much he tries to get them to ‘fess up.

He knows it is a child that’s crying. He’s been in that situation often enough that’d recognise the sound everywhere. Slowly Percy gets up from the couch, wearing the blanket like a cape and his bag of popcorn like a mace. It’s a flimsy weapon, but crying children aren’t supposed to be dangerous.

Only those that made them cry are.

‘Are you okay?’ he asks, lingering in the doorway to the hall. The light switch is a mere metre away, near enough that he should be able to press it before a shadow monster comes to take his hand. ‘You’re… alone, right?’ That seems like a wise question to ask.

There’s no answer. The sniffling sound has gone down, with only the rare, strangled sob as proof that he hasn’t imagined it. It is as if someone is trying to hold their tears in, but not quite succeeding. Biting his lip, Percy wrecks his brain. He tries to go over scenarios like the action heroes in the movies, but he can only really find one way to discover what is going on.

With a battle cry, he lunges to switch on the light, immediately backtracking into the living room and wildly checking around himself whether he’s still alone.

He is.

Already his heart is racing, which can’t mean too much good.

Inching closer to the hallway, Percy can see the phone. Would this warrant a call to his mom? The boy shakes his head. His fantasies aren’t enough reason to disrupt his parents’ dinner. It wouldn’t be fair with how much they’ve been looking forward to it and Paul is sure to be cross with him if it proves to be all in his imagination.

But he doesn’t imagine this sound, right?

A loud sob sounds from upstairs. It’s louder now, but that’s only because he’s half in the hallway. It must come from the attic.

The one place he was told not to go.

Percy finds his curiosity piqued. His desire for adventure is rapidly demolishing any lingering doubts and fears. If anything, this would be the perfect reason to break the rule. He will just say he was protecting them from the monsters!

Yes, he nods firmly to himself. That sounds like a proper plan.

Looking down at his bag of popcorn, however, he finds it a quite flimsy weapon. ‘I am coming!’ he shouts to the child upstairs, before running to the kitchen and grabbing two apples from the fruit basket. He can always throw them if it is a monster. Running is the smartest thing the characters do in the movies.

Putting on his brave face, Percy cautiously makes his way upstairs. He stops at the first floor, looking for the switch to turn the lamps on. The hall gets bathed in light, making it look a whole less scary than it did in the darkness. Making sure that there are no monsters in this part, the boy continues climbing another set of stairs.

This staircase is much narrower, the floorboards creaking when he puts his weight on it. The sniffling has stopped, and he shivers as the temperature seemingly drops. When he’s finally on top of the stairs, he’s faced with a door. This is the door he isn’t allowed to go open.

For a moment, Percy hesitates. Both his mom as Paul were very adamant about him not opening the door, but surely there’s no harm in it?

His mind goes back to his favourite movie, to the hero always looking for an adventure and experiencing the coolest things. This is his chance for an adventure—the only one he is likely to get with how reluctant his parents are of having him roam around the neighbourhood on his own.

Unconsciously his hand reaches for the doorknob. It is almost as if a strange energy is compelling him to do so. A second before he touches the metal, however, he pulls his hand back as if burned.

He really shouldn’t.

With the sound stopped, Percy decides to turn around. The boy goes one step down before a shaky voice stops him: ‘Please don’t go.’

Turning around, he strengthens his grip on his apples. ‘Who are you?’

The voice stays silent like he’s thinking the question over before answering: ‘I’m Nico, I live here in the attic.’

It is a boy. And one of his age too. Feeling a burst of excitement, Percy has turned the knob before he knows it. To his big surprise it opens without a hitch.

He thought they locked it.

The attic is pitch black. The window he knows is there at the front of the house doesn’t let in any light, too dirty by the jungle of cobwebs that’s in front of it. His apprehension rises, not sure anymore whether this was such a clever idea. ‘Where are you?’

The door slams shut.

Percy whimpers. This is where people start getting killed in horror movies. ‘Please don’t hurt me!’ A tear slips down his cheek.

‘Don’t be scared.’ It’s Nico, but he can’t see the boy anywhere.

He folds his arms protectively over his chest, making himself as small as possible.

Then the strangest thing happens. A white cloud materialises before him, morphing until he is faced with a ghost. The boy is somewhat see-through, even smaller than Percy though with similar unruly hair. His face is gaunt, his eyes haunted. He looks sad, and Percy doesn’t want him to look sad.

And thus he holds out his hand. Nico’s passes right through it, making him shiver. ‘My name is Percy. Are you a ghost?’

The boy stares at him like he’s an alien. He gapes before stuttering: ‘I—I am.’

‘That’s so cool!’ Percy can already think of a gazillion things to do. ‘Do you want to be my friend?’ He doesn’t have any, and if the movies hold some truth in them, ghosts can’t leave the places they’re bound to. Which means that Nico can’t suddenly move away and leave him alone all over again.

Surprised by the enthusiasm, the ghost boy merely nods slowly. ‘I… suppose I do?’

Percy’s too excited to be insulted by the questioning response and happily rambles on. He’s determined to make Nico his friend and he’ll just keep doing the friend stuff until the other submits.

Sitting down cross-legged in between the cityscape of moving boxes, he thinks hard of a game to play. His mind goes not to a movie, but to a show he once watched with the girl next door. While that was the first and last time they played together, he did remember the people inside the telly having a lot of fun. ‘Have you ever heard of twenty questions?’

It’s easy to lose track of time when you’re having fun, and so Percy only realises that his parents have come home when his mother shouts for him at the bottom of the stairs. He startles violently, scaring Nico away as he rushes to leave the attic.

‘I will visit you soon!’ he whisper-yells before closing the door and stealthily sneaking down. Once in the hallway he turns his attention towards his mom: ‘Coming!’

A little while later when she has come to kiss him good night in his bed, Percy’s mind drifts back to Nico. He hasn’t felt this much excitement in a long time. It’s his little secret, his friendly house ghost friend.


End file.
